


the softness of a whisper/ that keeps harshness at a distance

by sprx77



Series: Annoyingly, I like you way more than I'd originally planned [4]
Category: Naruto
Genre: Alternate Universe - Modern Setting, Alternate Universe - Sentinels & Guides, Alternate Universe - Sentinels and Guides Are Known, God now I want to write Kawarama in a S/G universe someone shoot me, Guide Senju Tobirama, M/M, Nobody is Dead, Sentinel/Guide, The other seven siblings are mentioned, Tobirama Senju has six doctorates and counting, Tobirama Senju's ridiculous sensor abilities, Uchiha Izuna Lives, but don't make appearances
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2018-09-16
Updated: 2018-09-16
Packaged: 2019-07-13 01:10:51
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 1,475
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/16007147
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/sprx77/pseuds/sprx77
Summary: Homecoming for the Alpha Sentinel Prime of North America, who has ninety-nine problems but his Guide isn't one. (Madara is 98 of them, though).





	the softness of a whisper/ that keeps harshness at a distance

**Author's Note:**

  * For [neutrons](https://archiveofourown.org/users/neutrons/gifts).



> Prompt by inconveniencedneutrons on tumblr: 2 and or 4 for Tobirama and a partner of your choice? Thank you so much and I hope you have a happy valentines day!

“You can do this but you can’t return my calls?” Tobirama asked, airy and petulant.

“Oh my god  _shut up_ ,” Izuna said into the material of his shirt as he sank down to his knees. His breath fanned out hot and wet onto the front of Tobirama’s boxers. “I told you, I was working a case.”

“For three days?”

“My phone literally fell into a sewer, I told you this. It was a miserable stakeout and a miserable chase and all I wanted the whole time was to be back here, at home, with you.” Izuna rolled his eyes and pressed his cheek to the impressive tent in the fabric in front of his face.

He just  _breathed_ , everything in him settling now that he was surrounded by familiar scents and textures. That’s a background contentment, though, the calming senses of home. Taking up roughly ninety nine percent of his focus and crowding out everything else is Tobirama.

Careful hands card through Izuna’s hair, soothing despite the spiteful words. It’s easy, to fall into snark with his husband. Easy enough that he can manage the words without thought, responding even though he’s been on the edge of a zone since walking through the door and on his knees about .2 seconds after that. Say what you want about him, he has  _priorities_.

“Did you catch him?” Tobirama asks, indulgent and still petting, as though he has nothing better to do than stand in their living room with Izuna at his feet, very nearly hugging his legs. It’s an idle question, as though, also, Tobirama can’t read the weary but triumphant exhaustion curling around Izuna’s synapses, or wherever the hell emotions get stored. The outspoken words are another step to the dance, not mechanically _necessary,_ but well-worn and appreciated.

“Yeah.” Izuna says, breathing deep. Cinnamon and books, fresh-inked notebook pages and tea leaves, hours old sweat and the lingering scent of New Haven fauna.  _Tobirama_. The soft pads of calloused fingertips on his scalp, parting his hair with the ease of practice, soothing like it’s second nature.

“You were on the edge of my range the  _entire time_ ,” Tobirama complains, and now that a few minutes have passed he gathers Izuna up, an unprotesting lump of Sentinel, and lets them both fall sloppy onto the couch.

“I was in  _San Francisco_ ,” Izuna says indignantly.

“Ugh.” Tobirama responds, arranging them more carefully. Izuna goes along with it, pleased at the skin contact and the way his face ends up pressed into Tobirama’s neck. “Close enough that I could feel your location, sense you moving around, but just far enough away that I couldn’t get a read on your emotional state or communicate with you. It was awful.”

“Tobirama.” Izuna says, patient. “I was literally on the west coast. You shouldn’t have been able to sense me  _at all_.”

“Don’t be ridiculous.” Tobirama huffs. “I can sense you anywhere within the continent. Even, apparently, when I’m on the exact other side of it. Longways.”

Izuna huffed back, grinding his shoulder a little into Tobirama’s chest.

“Can you sense your brothers like that?” He tries not to get lost in the feel of soft skin and slight scars, invisible to the sight and the touch unless one is focused on them with hyper-aware senses. He mostly succeeds. Izuna has spent eighteen months memorizing the unique tapestry of his Guide’s skin, and after so long away from the man he has all five senses grounded on, it’s enough to nearly hypnotize him.

“Only within the country, for them.” Tobirama concedes, almost grudgingly. As though that’s not remarkable and to be expected, given how young he’d have imprinted his siblings.

Izuna sighs into his skin, loving the way his breath causes a small spattering of goosebumps to break out across the flesh. From the moment he’d stepped off the plane, he could  _feel_ Tobirama in his head, welcoming him, reconnecting with him.

When he walked into the apartment building Tobirama’s mind had wrapped around his, reaching out and soothing outer shields worn ragged—from the case, the distance, the plane ride—and strengthening his primary ones, blending with them and taking over so that Izuna could truly and fully  _relax_.

“Next time I’m coming with you.” Tobirama says, low and fervent. “I’ll shove my thesis up the board’s asses if they don’t grant me an extension to defend.”

Tobirama’s heartbeat has become a lullaby, heavy and steady under his ear. He digs his shoulder a little into Tobirama’s chest, snorting. Responding takes a bit more energy than he counted on, he’s so  _grounded_  on his Guide. There’s nothing beyond the five senses that isn’t  _Tobirama_ , this close and with how long they were apart. Even the apartment beyond the couch is a vague idea to his senses, much less the building and world beyond it.

It would be dangerous, letting his guard down so much, except Tobirama can literally sense every person in the city and their dispositions, at any given second. Passively.

He doesn’t have to worry about intruders or someone getting the drop on him with Tobirama’s senses being what they are.

Besides, his husband is an actual badass. Izuna has no idea where he finds the time to keep up with martial arts with his teaching schedule, but he does.

“Next time?” Izuna breathes, a bit mumbly with how dazed he is—after nearly a week, burying himself in the familiar and  _safe_  scents and sounds of home and Guide and mate and Pride is like lowering yourself into the world’s most comfortable bed after three straight days awake—but amused despite it. “Five doctorates not enough for you?”

He can hardly keep his eyes open.

“Six, now.” Tobirama corrects, smiling. The shift of his lips and the currents of the words interrupting the air around them.

“Ridiculous.” Izuna grumbles. With Tobirama shielding for both of them it feels like a great weight is off his shoulders. He has amazing primary shields, more than most Sentinels bother with, honestly, and they’ve become unconscious to use and maintain at full strength. His secondary shields are the ones that take a beating from day-to-day activities, pounded on by stimulus from fucking-everything.

It’s an act of unspeakable intimacy for Tobirama to take over his  _primary_  shields, the ones he developed before he even came online—the instinctive defenses of a child, thrown up out of necessity to keep him sane before he even knew what Sentinels or Guides were.

Speaking of acts of unspeakable intimacy—

A white leopard hops nimbly and gracefully onto the couch with them, curling contentedly around them.

Izuna huffs.

“And where were  _you_  during our trying separation?” He asks, scratching behind Tobirama’s spirit animal’s ears. It tolerates this, but doesn’t deign answer his question.

A parakeet flies in from nowhere, chirping happily. It lands on Tobirama’s head.

The Alpha Guide Prime of North America sighs heavily, trying not to smile at the bird nesting in his bird’s nest of messy white hair.

The parakeet is dappled blue and white, like clouds against the bluest of skies, and it half camouflages with Tobirama’s hair, tapping around with little bird feet until it’s comfortable.

“You didn’t sleep while I was away.” Izuna realizes, noting the lines under his Guide’s eyes, the way his whole body radiates tiredness.

“I was defending my thesis.” Tobirama protests. “Getting a doctorate is hard.”

“Mhm,” Izuna hums, disbelieving. “At least I had an excuse. Hotel sheets, even nice ones, aren’t  _our_  sheets. And I was missing my Guide.”

“Well  _I_  was missing my Sentinel.” Tobirama counters, sliding an arm around Izuna’s chest. He snorts. “Besides, you left me here with all  _seven_  of our siblings. It’s a miracle I got any rest at all.”

Izuna rolls his eyes—or he would, if they were open.

He can’t be bothered to lift his lids, surrounded as he is with warmth and safety and snark, the smells of his mate and their mingled scents from the apartment wafting over him, them, creating a cocoon of bliss.

Izuna never wants to leave this couch. He says as much, slurring a little with how close to sleep he is. Finally.

“Or at least,” He mutters. “We’re not leaving the apartment all weekend. We deserve a few days of sleep and sex before we have to deal with my siblings or your brothers.”

“Don’t give me false hope, Sentinel.” Tobirama murmurs, breath just a step away from laughing into his hair.

“You’re all I need in this world, Guide.” Izuna manages, sleepily drawing their fingers together, tangling them over his chest. “Everything else can wait.”

“I missed you.” Tobirama admits, warm and homey. Izuna thinks he might say more, but beyond the soft sensation of lips to his temple, he knows nothing but dreams.

It’s good to be home.

**Author's Note:**

> Have you ever clicked random, unknown poetry looking for titles, and found a not-that-great poem that has great lines to steal? On some backwater website where people publish their own poetry?
> 
> TLDR title from here http://www.netpoets.com/poems/love/0429001.htm


End file.
